The Last Place I Want To Be
by orsumfenix
Summary: After the events of Tarsus IV, the last place Jim Kirk wants to be is in a hospital, cooped up in a ward with five injured teenagers and a guy on work-experience. Really, all he wants is to go somewhere private, quiet and peaceful. Leonard McCoy is excited to be getting his work-experience in the best hospital, but finds that his days there aren't exactly going to be the best...
1. Chapter 1

_**Mentions of Tarsus, so the usual warnings that come with that. I don't own Star Trek, or the characters, nor do I claim to. **_

_**It's still set in the Star Trek universe, but everyone's a teenager and in hospital together, for various reasons. I LOVE Tarsus fics, so I decided that I should write one of my own. Well, at least one that has Tarsus IN it. **_

_**First Trek fic, so don't kill me if I get stuff wrong. And if I slip into past tense, I apologise. **_

_**So, please read, review and ENJOY! **_

**After the events of Tarsus IV, the last place Jim Kirk wants to be is in a hospital, cooped up in a ward with five injured teenagers and another on work-experience. Really, all he wants is to go somewhere private, quiet and peaceful. Leonard McCoy is excited to be getting his work-experience in the best hospital around, and he finds that his 'patients' are...well...interesting... **

"Do…do you want to talk about it?"

The psychiatrist is watching him with concern, leaning forwards with fingers interlaced. His bald head is shining under the glare of the sunlight filtering through the windows. It's a hot day, and really stuffy inside the hospital, but Jim can't really bring himself to care. After surviving for months on end with only a little food and being exhausted from running away from the people he trusted, a little heat isn't really that big of a deal.

He shakes his head, staring out the hospital window at the hill. It's lovely outside, lovely and green and lush. And it makes him want to be sick.

Tarsus used to look like that once. Before the crop failure, before the famine, before the murders. It used to be a textbook case of paradise, a place where all the locals looked after each other and the children played in amongst the crops, always careful not to damage any. But then the locals turned against each other, turned each other in survival before being killed anyway. The children ran through empty fields of what used to be crops, no longer playing being chased but really running for their lives. Some children were shot down whilst running, either shot by a phaser or by an old-fashioned rifle, no one caring when their strawberry coloured blood stained the floor.

He'd gotten lucky there. Never once had he been caught when he was running, after stealing food from Kodos himself. God knows the soldiers had tried to catch him, but he'd always been too fast for him.

His psychiatrist, Dr Peters, wrinkles his brow in concern for the younger boy in front of him. Jim ignores him. This man is just one of many who had claimed that he can talk to them, they understand. He wants to laugh bitterly at that. If they understood, they'd be getting counselling themselves. They weren't on Tarsus. They don't understand.

_No one _understands.

Of course, the other survivors do, but none of them that aren't family can see each other. Most of them have already gone home, sent back to their relatives on Earth or Vulcan or wherever their family is. He's going to be kept in the hospital for much longer, he knows. His condition was more severe than the others', with him having often given up his own food for someone else and staying up late to keep watch.

He almost died, they tell him. Had he received medical attention a day later his body simply would have shut down, as some of the other members of the colony's had. Sometimes he wonders if it would have been such a bad thing if he _had _died – that way, he wouldn't be cooped up in this hospital, being pressured to talk about something he _really _didn't want to talk about.

"No," is all he says. "No, I don't want to talk about it. Can I go to my room now?"

Hesitantly, Dr Peters agrees, informing him that he _will _be returning, and Jim really should think about speaking to someone.

He gives him a tight smile, knowing that speaking to someone isn't going to make the memories go away. If it did, he would have spoken to every doctor and nurse there was in the entire hospital.

When he's walking to his private room, the nurse takes him in the opposite direction from usual, smiling slightly at his look of confusion.

"Your condition is more stable now," his nurse, a gentle woman called Michele, informs him. "So the doctors have decided to move you to one of the teenage wards. It's not going to be as private, but you'll be able to interact with the other patients. Don't worry," she assures him. "You won't be here forever. Just until you've put on enough weight and we're confident that your body is accustomed to food."

Since he arrived here, he has thrown up almost everything he's eaten, much to the displeasure of the doctors. They've had to use an IV lead to get nutrition in his body.

He knows that he should care more than he does about the fact that he no longer gets his own room, but he can't really bring himself to care. _Anywhere _is better than Tarsus.

After being led through endless corridors that all look the same (he's never going to find his way out again – this place is like a maze,) they finally arrive at Ward 7b. It looks like nothing special from the outside, just the general ward, white walls, a sign listing the patients, 7b written next to the entrance. But as soon as he walks in, he sees that the walls were _covered _in posters.

Like, _completely _covered in posters. There must be at least fifty, all taped to the wall with some sort of motivating comment on them, like 'Say NO to drugs' and 'You CAN achieve your goals' and 'Dream it, believe it, achieve it.' They've probably been taken straight out of a cheap primary school.

And they look about a hundred years old.

He is directed to his bed, where someone has already moved all of the personal items his mother sent in, including his duvet. His PADD even lies on the bedside table, the one he'd thought he lost on Tarsus. Huh. The Star Fleet officers there must have looked up his address and collected his stuff.

It makes him feel sick, that they've walked through his auntie's house just to get his things, when the other people that lived there are dead, and their stuff won't be returned to them.

He sits on the bed and looks at the other sleeping places. Most of them are empty, though he can see that someone is currently staying there. The only bed occupied is that of a girl's. She's quite pretty, with dark, long hair in a ponytail and smooth skin to match. She's flicking through a magazine, raising her eyebrows at some things and laughing at others. She briefly glances at him when he comes in, but otherwise pays him no attention.

Michele goes, leaving him alone. He studies the ward, counting the beds. Eight in total, including his own, and two of those eight have no personal items, so it's safe to assume that those two are unoccupied.

He briefly wonders if the other teenagers here will be similar to him, if some of them were on Tarsus, but quickly dismisses the thought. The Federation is obviously adamant that all survivors be kept apart, and as far as he can tell he is the only one at the hospital. It's meant to be one of the best, for the brightest people only, and he may not be that clever enough to be able to get in on his own, but he's smart enough to know that they let him in because of his father.

The other kids probably only have physical injuries, while he has mental problems as well. One of the admirals wanted him to be sent to a mental hospital instead of a normal one, and personally Jim agreed (even though he knew he'd get drugs to knock him out without nightmares,) but in the end it was decided that he was too malnourished and fatigued to go anywhere but this place.

Of course, that didn't stop them from sending one of the top psychiatrists to see him, as if that will help any.

He has nothing better to do, so Jim hesitantly reaches for the PADD and turns it on. Sure enough, it is _his _PADD, the one he'd left behind on Tarsus when Kodos had announced to his family that he needed to speak to them and half of the colony. Of course, they'd trusted their leader, and walked straight into a massacre completely unprepared and defenceless. In hindsight, they should have known that the soldiers wouldn't need to be escorting them if it was friendly, that they wouldn't have weapons and be looking so guilty, that Kodos wouldn't refuse to meet anyone's eyes or look so shifty. They'd blindly walked in, everyone had, and they'd paid the price for it.

He scrolls down through the various novels he's collected through the years. It had been his tenth birthday present, and now he is fourteen, so he's had plenty of time to build up a private library. But most of these are the books he'd either bought or read on Tarsus. He feels bile rising in his throat, so he tosses the PADD to the side. He doesn't want any reminders.

But here he is, stuck in hospital, starved and sick, not even allowed to see Kevin or Tom or anyone, and things have only gotten slightly better.

* * *

Leonard grins as he reads the message his PADD has received. He is going to have his work-experience at the best hospital around, working in the teenage ward there. Funny how, even if it _is _the best hospital around, there is just one extremely small ward for the people about his age. Probably because it's meant to be for rich kids.

His smile fades a bit when he realises that they might be snooty, even if they are his age.

But, no, surely not _all _of them are. They're in a hospital, after all. That must be for a reason.

"The best hospital in Star Fleet," he mutters to himself, and the thought alone is enough to dredge a smile onto his lips. "And I'm getting work-experience there."

And, _oh_, Jocelyn will be impressed. Maybe she'll finally be so impressed that she'll go out with him. After all, only the best get to go to this hospital. Maybe she'll realise that he's the best for her.

_Whoa there, McCoy! Don't get ahead of yourself. _

He hurriedly begins packing, shoving his clothes into his big rucksack. His train to the hospital leaves tomorrow, really early in the morning, but he can't bring himself to complain. He's just glad he isn't on a flight there.

God, he hates flying.

In the morning, his alarm goes off exceptionally early. He groans as it shakes him from his slumber, slamming his hand down so hard on the top he's surprised he doesn't crush it.

It takes him a moment to rouse himself from his half-asleep state, but as soon as he does, a crocodile grin creeps onto his face. He's going to the hospital today, and nothing can drag his mood down.

After hurriedly going through his morning routine, careful not to wake any of his dorm mates up, he grabs his rucksack and runs out the flat, calling for a taxi while he does. If he doesn't get one, he'll be late. Late to what he's always wanted to.

He's always wanted to be a doctor. Even when he was a toddler he would put on a white coat and slip a stethoscope round his neck, pretending to be looking after his dad, who'd 'been in a car crash.' All throughout his life Leonard has been encouraged to chase after his dreams, to try and get a job at the best hospital around. Now he has work-experience there. He can't afford to mess it up.

The train journey seems to last forever. He jiggles his knee up and down in boredom, checking his watch every few seconds. One of the old women on the train looks at him as if he's crazy, especially when he smiles maniacally at her. She frowns and shakes her head, muttering something about 'kids these days', which makes him want to laugh. He's going to a job, technically. Work. He isn't a kid, a _child_.

Some rational part of him knows that this isn't him, this isn't him _at all_. He doesn't act like this, all jaunty and happy, walking around with a spring in his step. He's the cold one, the bitter one in his little group of friends. He's the only one that drinks, a bottle of alchahol with him at all times. That includes now, on the way to the best hospital around. At last minute last night he'd stared at it, contemplating whether to take it or leave it, before realising that he wouldn't possibly be able to go for months at a time without at least _one _drink.

Whenever the hospital takes someone for work-experience, they're there for three to four months. Contrary to what most people think, that it's too much, Leonard thinks that three to four months isn't _enough_ time.

He arrives dead on time, which is a huge accomplishment for him. He'd had to run to his rented out apartment, dump his rucksack, remove the contents of his bag that he needed, lock up, and run to the hospital. When he arrives, one of the receptionists immediately recognises him from the picture they received of everyone they would be training, informing him that Admiral Pike, the descendent of the hospital's founder, will be briefing him and his new 'colleagues' (the others on work-experience) in half an hour. Turns out he's actually early, but she's very nice about it, directing him to the room the briefing will take place in and giving him a cup of coffee for while he's waiting.

"Don't worry," she says to him, seeing he's clearly embarrassed. "You're not the first to arrive. Young girl came in before you, and she was much calmer about it. Why don't you talk to her?"

And with that, she shuts the door behind him.

He scans the room, noting that there's only roughly ten seats in a room smaller than he anticipated. Almost every seat is empty, just one at the front occupied by a smallish blonde woman. He sits next to her, smiling at her enthusiasm as she greets him.

"Christine Chapel," she informs, shaking his hand. He returns the hand-shake out of politeness more than anything, though inside he's sharing her enthusiasm to be here.

"Leonard McCoy."

The room slowly fills up, each person looking more happy to be here than the last. Eventually Chris Pike, the man himself, comes in and briefs their work at the hospital. It's basically what he expects – he will be expected to act like a proper doctor, he will be given no critical/emergency patients, he is expected to treat his patients with care and respect.

And when they tell him that he is the only one working in his ward, he isn't really surprised. How else is he meant to prove himself?

"Last thing," Pike announces, looking each and every one of them in the eye. It send shivers down Leonard's spine when he locks his. "And this is vitally important. _Do not screw this up_. You screw this up, you don't get a second chance. I'm sure you've all heard of John Harrison, or Kahn as I hear he is called now. He screwed it up, and we lost patients' lives because of it. You make a mistake, it could be fatal. And if it is…" He trails off, letting their minds fill in the blanks. _If it's fatal, your career is forever ruined. If it's fatal, you have to live with it for the rest of your life. _

He takes a deep breath. Whatever happens, he is _not _going to make a mistake.

He gets to go home after that. He'll meet his patients tomorrow, and then the real work will begin.

At night, he lies in his bed, staring at the ceiling. He's already received a list of the patient's names, but he doesn't want to create mental image in his head then have it ruined by meeting the actual people.

It's strange to think that he'll be treating people just a little under his age, maybe even a bit older. But he'll be a doctor, and they won't. Hopefully they'll be nice to them, and none of them will have something _that _serious, or they wouldn't even be letting him treat them in the first place.

With a sigh, he drifts off.

Tomorrow, he will finally get a chance to be a doctor.

**_Hopefully, I'll update again soon. Thanks for reading, and please REVIEW! _**


	2. Chapter 2

**SO sorry for not updating! Real just got in the way SO much! **

**I don't own Star Trek. Don't claim to. **

**The**** first few chapters are mainly just introductory, setting the scene, but I _will _have big stuff happening. Thanks to the people who reviewed, favourited or followed! **

Spock sighs as he walks into the ward with his father, who'd just had a long conversation with him about how it wasn't 'logical' to get in a fight. After all, it was said fight that got him landed here, with a broken leg and several cracked ribs and a sprained wrist.

It's _hard _controlling emotions. Every time he even _thinks _about those boys he clenches his fists (well, fist – it hurts his sprained wrist if he clenches his hand) and begins seething. His father constantly tells him to calm down, even getting permission from the hospital to take him outside and sternly talk him about how vital it is that he doesn't lose control.

He does agree with his father, contrary to what the older Vulcan believes. He chose to embrace his Vulcan side as opposed to his human, and he plans to fulfil his father's, and his own, wishes. He plans to fit in _somewhere_, and that somewhere just so happens to be Vulcan.

He looks around the ward as he enters, noticing that the girl from before, that arrived yesterday, is still sitting in her bed, flicking through magazine articles. He's never really sure why people read magazines – their information is unreliable and is often just a made-up story. He tries telling this to her before, but she'd frowned at him before shrugging and turning back to a picture of a celebrity with implanted cleavage, snorting at the quote 'they're natural!'

He may be half human, but the things they do puzzle him so much sometimes.

It also doesn't escape his notice that there is a boy who wasn't there before, leaning back on the pillows staring into nothing on the previously empty bed.

Spock allows a frown to form. Whilst the girl, Nyota is her name, if he remembers correctly, is reading obviously false information to occupy her mind, this boy is doing nothing, just staring at the rest of the room, as if he can see something Spock can't. It creeps him out slightly, to be honest. There are plenty of other things this boy can be doing (eating, for example, he notes, taking in the fact that he can see the boy's ribs under his shirt,) but no. unlike the other humans he's met, the boy simply sits and stares.

It seems to scare Nyota slightly, too, as she keeps looking over her magazine and frowning in the boy's direction. It is clearly bothering her. If Spock is completely honest with himself, it bothers him greatly as well.

His father leaves without a word. Perhaps he, too, finds this boy with blonde hair and blue eyes slightly disturbing, but he is a Vulcan, so then again, perhaps not.

Slowly, watching the boy out the corner of his eye, Spock moves towards his own bed, the furthest from the door and closest to the window, opposite from Nyota's. She glances at him while he sits down, her eyes flicking back and forth between him and the boy before finally settling back on whatever article she's reading. He has yet to hear her say a single word.

Pavel, Hikaru and 'Scotty' (as the boy insisted he be called) are currently taking a walk outside, under the doctors' supervision. They had invited Nyota, but she'd rolled her eyes and gone back to her magazine without saying a word.

Spock is unsure of what he is supposed to be doing. He has never understood hospital, why there seems to be nothing to do to occupy time. All there seems to be is sit and talk to doctors, and take the occasional walk outside.

Thinking of walks, the other three teenagers return from theirs at that moment, making the blue-eyed boy shake his head and grab a PADD, and begin to read.

Spock has to admit, it was smart to bring something to do. Logical. Why didn't he think to do that?

* * *

_The next day... _

"So… you're twenty-four?"

"Yes."

"You've completed Medical School?"

"Of course."

"You act younger than you are."

"…Is that a compliment?"

Leonard watches the guy in front of him. 'Dr Puri' has tousled brown hair and dark stubble on the lower half of his face, a constant scowl etched on. He reminds Leonard of what he looked like before he found out that he was getting his work experience here, when he was sick and tired of Jocelyn ignoring him.

"I don't know. Do you want it to be?"

McCoy tries to refrain from rolling his eyes at the guy in front of him, who is perhaps one of the cockiest people he has ever met. And one of the most sarcastic. He hasn't stopped going on about how he is a 'professional' doctor ever since he collected Leonard from the lobby.

"I'm not quite sure how to answer that. But…shouldn't we go in now?"

They have been standing outside the door to the teenage ward for about twenty minutes now, Dr Puri just asking questions and Leonard giving him answers. Said doctor just rolls his eyes at the younger man.

"Okay, if that's what you want. Here's the deal. You will only be treating patients that will be re-treated by me, a _professional_ doctor. You is supervised at all times by me or one of the nurses. You make a mistake, you're straight out that door, you got me?"

Leonard nods slowly, certain that Puri will find a way to twist anything he says.

And with that, Puri opens the door, an old wooden thing that's bright blue and could a walking traffic light. All of the doors look like that, a stark contrast to the plain white walls of the labyrinth of corridors.

Leonard isn't quite sure what he was expecting. Maybe a ward full of yelling kids? For the place to be smashed up? He certainly wasn't expecting a room filled with enthusiastic mottos and occupied by very _un_enthusiastic teenagers.

Eight beds, four on each side, only six with actual people in them. The entire left side has people in, and the right has a single at the far end, one at the closest. Three, from the closest beds on the left side, are the only ones who look happy to here, one of them chattering energetically in a Scottish accent with the other two listening closely.

There only seems to be one girl in the ward, at the far end on the left side by the huge window that covers almost the entire wall. She's flicking through a magazine, chewing gum and occasionally flicking her long ponytail further over her shoulder.

The other two boys look like they aren't even the room with them. The furthest, on the right opposite the girl, stares out the window in disinterest, blank-faced but obviously bored (and obviously a Vulcan). The closest, two unoccupied beds away from the other, simply stares a PADD. From any other angle, it would look like he was reading it, but from the door Leonard can see that the PADD is not, in fact, switched on.

Dr Puri clears his throat loudly, making the conversation peter out and everyone, including the boys, look up at him. He smiles with full teeth, something that McCoy actually finds quite creepy. It seems to bother the others, with the exception of one of the boys with startling blue eyes and blonde hair, who just smirks slightly, as if amused, and the Vulcan (which isn't a surprise).

"Kids," he says, making the word sound like something he scraped off the bottom of his shoe. "This is Leonard McCoy. He's here to do work-experience."

At that, the girl looked back to her magazine (she has, McCoy notes, about twenty stacked at the bottom of the bed) and cocks one perfectly arched eyebrow at an article.

Both boys on the right go back to staring at nothing, and the ones on the left go back to talking/listening. Only the youngest in the ward, about ten (not really a teenager, but too old for the kids' ward) spares him a small smile, before turning to the Scottish boy, who is waving a PADD around with fury written all over his face. The Japanese-looking boy is just looking like he's trying not to laugh.

He sighs as Dr Puri quickly checks them all over and passes him a clipboard, sitting down on the only seat in the ward, and scanning his new 'patients'.

**_Nyota Uhura Spock _**(apparently no first/second name)

**_Montgomery Scott Unoccupied _**

**_Hikaru Sulu Unoccupied _**

**_Pavel Chekov James T. Kirk _**

He quickly matches names to faces, due to the bed positions. The teens are not seriously harmed, most have just been in accidents, with the exception of Uhura (recently had her appendices removed) and Kirk (malnutrition).

For now, he decides to refer to them by second names, except for Spock. It just doesn't seem right to be so…_familiar _with them.

Besides, he's a doctor (for now) and they're his patients. It wouldn't do to get attached.

* * *

Nyota Uhura can't believe that she is stuck in a room full of _boys_.

Seriously, can't she have at least _one _female companion? Her best friend Gaila has already visited, but it's not the same as having someone there to _talk _to. All she has to do is read the magazines her mother brought her, ones that she's already read, what, fifty times?

Her life was fine, she was doing well in class, especially linguistics, but then it was all ruined by _stupid _appendicitis. Honestly, you would have thought by now they'd have got rid of it. But, _no_, she was carted off to hospital. And once they'd removed the organ, they couldn't just send her home. Her mother insisted that she be allowed time to 'recover' in a hospital, paying for her to be cooped up in a ward with five boys.

What has her life come to?

Her father hasn't visited yet. He basically payed for her to be here, him being the cause of their fortune, but he doesn't have the time of day for his only daughter, just for his business.

She feels ridiculous and pathetic, a cliché rich girl with daddy issues. But it's the truth. He'll buy her dresses and make-up and even a _car_, but spending the day with her is out of the question.

She spends most of her time with Gaila, away from her over-protective mother, but now more than ever she just wants a phone call, at the least, from her father.

Nyota ignores the guy on work-experience as he looks around. What's his name…McColl? He looks just like the other doctors, if only slightly younger. It's not as if she needs medical treatment, anyway. Her appendix has been removed and she's fully recovered. Her mother just wants to be sure, and never really _has _listened to her only daughter.

She wishes one of her four brothers was here instead. At least they wouldn't be ignored.

"Hey," a voice says. She looks up from her magazine to see that boy, the blonde one that arrived yesterday, sitting on the edge of her bed. She cocks an eyebrow.

"Hey," Nyota replies, unsure of what she's actually meant to be saying. He grins ruefully and looks around with disinterest, gaze lingering on the window before returning back to her.

"So what's your name?" he asks casually, bright blue eyes twinkling. "I'm Jim. Jim Kirk."

"Why should I tell you my name?" she simply asks, inwardly smiling when he pouts. Under no circumstances is she going to give him her name. That would be saying that she's willing to be friendly with him, which she's not. She'll probably be leaving soon, anyway.

"That isn't fair!" he complains. "I told you _my _name."

"Did I ask for it?" she quips, turning back to her magazine, wondering if he's bipolar.

See, one minute Kirk (she refuses to call him Jim) is all depressed, refusing to speak to any of them, the next, he seems insanely happy. When McCoy (_that's _his name) comes over, he grins widely (and slightly manically) before sauntering off to his own bed.

Nyota shakes her head.

_Boys. _

* * *

He watches the security cameras. Of course, _now _they take extra care with the people on work-experience. If only they'd taken that much care beforehand.

The kid that his associate wanted is there, too. The cocky blonde one.

He smiles. Soon, he will have his revenge.

**This chapter's shorter than the last one...SORRY! **


End file.
